


did not welcome dusk

by kokiri



Category: ASTRO (Band)
Genre: Apocalypse, Flowers, I'm Sorry, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-30
Updated: 2017-06-30
Packaged: 2018-11-21 09:29:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11354640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kokiri/pseuds/kokiri
Summary: they're called the wisconsin red dahlia.





	did not welcome dusk

**Author's Note:**

  * For [crumbling](https://archiveofourown.org/users/crumbling/gifts).



> this is for hannah. i hope you love it.

The air didn’t feel right for Dongmin to keep up the garden on the school’s roof, but he tried anyway. Bin had forgotten to ask him which flower he was going to be obsessed with cultivating this year – he remembered that he had been dying to know while he was smacking the chalkboard erasers together to dust them out; it had been his classroom chore for as long as he could remember and he would probably be smacking erasers together at the very moment that the world decided to finally end.

“You look pretty stupid,” Sanha said. Bin made some absentminded remark about how he was tired of dealing with kids and wished that their school was big enough to actually maintain classes for all grade levels instead of shoving everyone in a single classroom and expecting that to go over harmoniously. That was what happened when everyone was busy fearing the end of the world – always packing up and going to some happier, safer place. Some place with more friends and family. Some place where dying would be sort of seamless.

Once he was done – actually, he shoved the erasers off on Sanha and asked for his help in a way that was a thinly veiled demand – he followed Dongmin up the stairs to the rooftop and leaned against the doorway, watching Dongmin water and carefully attend to the flowers that were his pride and joy.

They were red this year. Red like the tips of Dongmin’s ears when Bin snuck up behind him and jammed his fingers into his ribcage the way he had been doing since they were kids.

Red like Dongmin’s lips would probably look after a kiss or two.

Yes, Bin decided. That shade of red.

“They’re called the Wisconsin Red dahlia,” Dongmin explained. Bin nodded and hummed. He could never understand how Dongmin could tell flowers apart by the color and shape when they all looked more or less the same to him.

Pretty and nice – like Dongmin – but all the same.  
  
  
  


Bin learned that the Wisconsin Red dahlias were actually kind of uncommon, passed down from old families and somehow ended up making their way into Dongmin’s grandmother’s garden. She had passed away since and Dongmin had promised to her he would keep her garden alive as long as he could manage, what with the end of the world being just around the corner.

The reason why Dongmin thought it was important to mention the rarity is that he was crying and crying that half of them didn’t bloom despite all of his best efforts. But he would try his hardest to maintain to the ones that were left behind.

That was decidedly the wrong moment for Bin to lean in for a kiss, but Dongmin blushed all the way to the tips of his ears and was now more flustered than upset. Bin would take that as a victory.

 

 

Sanha was gone. His family had finally saved up enough money to take a train six hours north to where their relatives lived. Bin now had no one to shove his eraser duties off to. So, he clapped and clapped them together while Dongmin snuck out to the gardens upstairs - which were looking more and more pitiful every day, if Bin was being honest.  
  
  
  


“I read once that anemone represents feelings of hopefulness. It was my favorite for a while, because I really needed that type of feeling at the time. I also read that it can represent feeling forsaken. That’s a little closer to how I feel nowadays,” Dongmin explained.

“Forsaken?” Bin asked.

“By the Wisconson Red dahlias,” Dongmin said. “I was really counting on them. And they let me down.”

It was stupid. It was just almost stupid how Dongmin managed to be simple in the face of everything. Earthquakes were a little more common nowadays. The lights would flicker and their favorite books would fall off of the shelf as the earth shook beneath them. And here Dongmin was, worried about his flowers.

“And amaryllis represents splendid beauty. An abundance of beauty. Not just a regular type of beauty. Something so beautiful you can’t even stand it,” Dongmin continued.

“Oh,” Bin said. “So… like you?” he said.

“Don’t be cheesy,” Dongmin laughed. “And don’t tell lies either.”

“I’ve never lied to you before, Dongmin,” Bin said, “and I don’t intend to start now.”  
  


On good nights, Bin didn’t dream at all. But on bad nights, Dongmin was there. They would try to kiss, but their lips would crumble before they could meet. Or Bin would grab his hand so they could run away together, but both of their hands would turn to dust as soon as they made contact.  

Bin would wake up crying.  
  
  
  


The more Dongmin’s flowers started wilting before his own eyes, the longer he would stay on the rooftop. Not doing much of anything, just staring at the ruin. Bin would often join him in a mopey sort of silence, only breaking it to occasionally remind him that that misery didn’t look too good on Dongmin.

“I just want something to last,” Dongmin said pitifully, his lower lip trembling. “Isn’t there something that you want to last the whole time we’re here? Isn’t there something that you want to protect?” he asked.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Bin knew that Dongmin hated it when questions were answered with more questions. “You,” Bin said, not prolonging Dongmin’s annoyance too much.

“Lately… the things you say are weird,” Dongmin said, tilting his head.

“That’s all you’ve derived from this?” Bin asked. He had to admit that he was a little disappointed. Bin hasing Dongmin in all of his free moments, the chaste kisses over wilted flowers, none of that meant anything to Dongmin besides some unusual Bin-isms.

They were sitting shoulder to shoulder against the wooden frame that was meant to serve as a safe home for the Wisconsin Red dahlias. It wasn’t much to look at anymore, with the majority of the blossoms cut down in their prime, but by what, the two boys had no clear idea. It just seemed to be something that was happening nowadays.

He grabbed Dongmin’s hand and squeezed it tight. “I mean it. I’m not worried about much of anything else. Isn’t it enough to want to sit next to you for a while? It’s okay for me to be satisfied by that, right?”

“I guess so,” Dongmin mumbled.

That night they slept on the roof, under a sky that did not welcome dusk.    
  
  
  


Bin promised to see Dongmin off at the train station when his time came to evacuate. Dongmin returned that smallest of favors by plucking the one remaining dahlia and tucking it behind Bin’s ear. They laughed a bit for how silly Bin looked and then they held hands. Dongmin didn’t much feel like talking, but that was fine.

And at least Bin could say, as the cracks in the earth below them grew bigger and bigger, that the two of them – together, or apart, but still loving each other either way - were meant to last until the end of it all.


End file.
